Arena Blog

Eliminate Barriers to Innovation Part IV

This is the fourth and final part of our series on how to
break down the barriers to product innovation. We have demonstrated how to
connect disparate product teams with a single source of truth to simplify
collaboration, streamline new development, and keep up with engineering changes.
Now we will discuss tips on how to create and maintain a proactive project
management operation and meet new product development and product introduction
(NPDI) regulations.

Earlier in this series, we cited the numerous barriers
to innovation and product development including distributed teams and global
supply chains, complex regulations, and a connected world of IoT devices. Of
these areas, manufacturers especially struggle with managing distributed teams
and complying with a myriad of regulations.

Any product that reaches the market today
has likely been designed, tested, and produced by hundreds or even thousands of
internal team members and supply chain partners. If stacked on top of each
other, the names would resemble the long list of credits at the end of a
movie.

Everyone involved in developing a product
strives to deliver it on time and on budget according to a determined list of
requirements and a specific sequence. But what happens when those teams are
scattered around the world, working in
different time zones and divisions with additional outside suppliers and
manufacturers? How do you keep everyone on the same page when changes are made
during design and production?

Keeping tasks and product records on the same page

To drive NPDI effectively and on
schedule, impacted product teams must manage every project deliverable in
context to the product design, which includes feasibility testing, prototyping,
and strategic sourcing. This process includes tracking multiple tasks and
information from all of these areas to keep teams aligned. However, the
transition from NPD and NPI can be complicated by teams that capture and track
their deliverables in manual or disparate systems.

In traditional pr oject management
settings, managers usually create and assign schedules, tasks, and milestones
with their teams for feedback, updates, and adjustments, which they record and
resubmit for additional reviews by the same teams. This continual loop of
sharing and collecting feedback is time consuming, inefficient, and prone to
produce difficulties and failures.

Sometimes project managers leverage
spreadsheets or file-sharing applications like Google, Box, or Dropbox. And
while these applications are easy to share and show feedback, they are
disconnected from full product design deliverables comprised of bills of
materials (BOMs), engineering changes, drawings, specifications, requirements,
and quality management records. These disconnected spreadsheets and systems fall
out of sync quickly with product and quality records.

Putting it all together

That’s why it’s so important to connect
product records and NPDI processes with project management deliverables to give
the entire product team complete visibility and instant context. With this
approach, every stakeholder can collaborate, track, and update the project
deliverables without researching disconnected systems. Teams can click on
deliverables and see related documents, design changes, and product configuration
in seconds.

Keeping so many teams, from engineering
to operations to supply chain partners, on the same page is critical to speed
NPI processes. Using a single product lifecycle management (PLM) solution
connected to projects and product information is the best way to reduce
confusion, delays, and even design issues. And more importantly, having a
single source of truth for products and related projects improves the product
design, speed product launches, and customer satisfaction.

Tackling regulatory compliance

If dispersed teams and disjointed project
management resources weren’t enough of a challenge, companies face a growing
list of regulatory directives from the
Food and Drug Administration (FDA), International Organization for Standardization
(ISO), and environmental safety standards like RoHS, REACH, WEEE, and conflict minerals. Failure to meet these regulations and
standards can delay or derail product launches and result in public warnings,
fines, and even company shutdowns.

Even minor regulatory compliance issues
can significantly delay product introductions, forcing companies to return to
the drawing board. Product redesigns can involve many teams and take longer to
resolve when issues are discovered later in the product release process.

Organizations often rely on quality and
regulatory assurance teams to drive validation processes that monitor and
comply with regulations and standards. Quality, engineering, and production
teams collaborate most effectively when working in a single, connected
system. By maintaining regulatory compliance
information in context with the entire product design and project plans,
today’s complex product companies are positioned to pass audits and avoid
unnecessary delays throughout the NPDI process.

And that wraps up our series. Hopefully
this was helpful to all you innovators out there. As long as you and others in
the manufacturing industry continue to contend with a convergence of
mechanical, electrical, and software designs, it’s important that we all share
best practices and lessons learned to improve NPDI and deliver great, compliant
products to market fast.

Do you use different
systems today for quality management, project management, or product management
of parts, BOMs, and engineering change processes? We would love to know what
works for you and whether you have any lessons learned to share.